New Attachments Feature: What It Can Do, and How to Use It

Kate Hawkes27 February 20190 comments

If you’ve ever run an event that accepts proposals for presentations, or tracked down certificates for membership applications, you’ve probably had to send hundreds of emails requesting these documents, or filed dozens of paper copies. For many organizations, collecting documents and images from members and event registrants can take up valuable time.

If that sounds like your experience, our new attachments feature is here to make those processes easier.

This feature allows you and your members to upload and edit documents and images directly to your Wild Apricot event registrations, member applications, donations, email subscriptions and member profiles. Read on for some ideas and to learn how to get started!

What Can You Do With Attachments?

With the attachments feature you can make it a requirement to submit certain documents — that means no more wasted time chasing paperwork. And because they’re directly uploaded to Wild Apricot, you can also easily see which files relate to each member. It can even be used by your members to share photos on their profile page, or as a way of issuing certificates.

The option to add attachments to forms and profiles might sound like a small change, but there are lots of different ways this feature can be used by admins, members and registrants. It helps make key processes like member applications and event registrations run more smoothly, and solves several requests on our Wishlist forum.

Depending on how you choose to set up the attachments feature, you can make it so that:

Event registrants can upload files as part of their registration

New members can upload files as part of their application

All forms allow or require a file to be uploaded

Members can share files on their member profiles

Admins can upload files to member profiles

Admins or members can edit the attachments that have been uploaded

This can be used for certificates, proof of status, portfolios, paper submissions, resumes, idea sharing, and lots more. Here are a few ideas of ways to use attachments, and how these could benefit your organization:

A Quick Guide to Using File Attachments

There are several ways you can enable members or visitors to upload files as attachments — all involve adding a file attachment field.

Step 1 — Add an attachment field to the relevant form.

If you want people to upload attachments on the registration form of a particular event:

Select the event you want to add the field to in the Event list.

Click the Registration form tab, and then click Edit.

Click Add new field, then follow Step 2.

If you want people to upload attachments on the membership application form or member profiles:

Select Membership fields under the Members menu.

Click Add new field, then follow Step 2.

If you want people to upload attachments on any form — membership application, donation, email subscription, and optionally event registration:

Select Common fields under the Contacts menu.

Click Add new field, then follow Step 2.

Step 2 — Set up your file attachment field.

Under Type, click File attachment.

In the Field label field, enter the label you want to display on the form for this field.

If you want this field to be mandatory, check the Required field checkbox.

You can limit the visibility of the field — eg. so that only administrators can upload and view files — and limit who can edit or view files. For detailed instructions on how to do this, see our Help page.

For all field types, you have the option of entering field instructions that will appear below the field on the form.

Once you are finished setting your field options, click the green Save all changes button at the top.

The attachment field will on appear on the form like this:

To add an attachment, your members or visitors just need to click Choose files and select from the files on their device. Depending on the options you set for file management, they may be able to edit or delete these attachments later.

FAQ

What types of files can I attach?

Is there a limit to the number of files I can attach?

On forms you can upload up to 20 files for each attachment field, with each file a maximum of 20 MB. There is no limit to the number of files that can be attached to a member profile, and file attachments do not count towards your site storage limit.

Can I attach files in a forum?

Yes. When adding or replying to forum topics, members can attach up to 20 documents and images, with each file a maximum of 20 MB. For more information, see our Help page.